Jumpers is a relatively long standing horse racing tipster service which is being offered through Premium Sports Tipsters. Selections come courtesy of one Gary Livermore.
Introduction to Jumpers
I can’t speak for everybody here, but I tend to think of horse racing as just being this singular entity. If it involves horses racing, then it’s horse racing. But that’s like saying any sport that involves kicking a ball is football. It might technically be true, but it’s a long way from the reality of the situation. The reason that I am starting out talking about this today is because the service that I am looking at also relies heavily on this distinction. And honestly, when you go away and think about it, it makes perfect sense that this should be the case.
All of this leads me to the very frankly named Jumpers. A service that, as the name suggests, concerns itself entirely with National Hunt racing (the one that involves jumping, in case you didn’t know. Think the Grand National). And this is a focus that is like a laser. Gary Livermore knows exactly what he is setting out to do, and he appears to do a bloody good job of it. Factor in that Premium Sports Tipsters are a generally decent tipster management group and things start to look pretty good. Especially with headlines like “Would You Like To Make £10k This Winter?”.
So, I can start wrapping this one up, right? Well, not exactly. Because whilst I can fully appreciate what Gary Livermore is doing, and why Premium Sports Tipsters have opted to chase this angle, this isn’t a service that will be for everybody. In fact, if you can’t meet certain conditions, Jumpers will almost certainly not be for you. And with that in mind, let’s get into the details of this.
What Does Jumpers Offer?
There is a lot that differs when looking at something like Jumpers compared to most other horse racing tipster services on the market. And that is the idea of a National Hunt season. With a lot of flat racing tipsters, they will happily tip all year round because there is always racing. And with five locations across the UK and Ireland, there is always something on. National Hunt racing however requires the softer ground that winter brings.
So, the first major thing to keep in mind here is that you will only be betting from October through to March. Compared to broader tipster services, this can be viewed as a positive or a negative thing, but in the case of Jumpers, I think that it ultimately proves quite important (for reasons that I will come to a little later on).
The management of the service is, of course, handled by Premium Sports Tipsters. They have been doing this for some time and as such, you can easily manage your expectations here. As you would expect, selections are issued directly via email. These contain all of the information that you need to get your bets placed, however, in order to get the most out of Jumpers, you should be aiming for BOG or an odds comparison site.
The blunt fact of the matter is that the difference in results for Jumpers is drastic if you aren’t in a position to get decent odds and value. We’re talking about a difference of a shade under 160 points between BOG and the SP. As such, this means that if you are really thinking of following Gary Livermore, you have to be sure that you are both willing and able to get bets down as soon as you receive them.
In terms of the bets themselves, there is a bit of a mix. You can expect to see a decent combination of both win and each way bets (although you do see slightly more of the former than the latter). Generally speaking, these are distributed based on the kinds of odds that you will be backing a horse at.
On the topic of odds (again, I know, I know…) there is a significant range at play here. There is yet to be a horse that ahs been advised at less than evens (to BOG), but that doesn’t mean that you are looking at simply backing favourites. In actual fact, Gary Livermore often advises selections that you can get odds for that run well into double digits.
Something that is worth noting and stands out to me is the fact that there can however be a good few of these bets advised. The fact is that whilst Gary Livermore doesn’t tend to back many horses on a given day, the number of selections are consistently two or three bets per day. That can start to add up over a season, especially with the staking plan.
Now, first things first, I have to establish something. Premium Sports Tipsters’s proofing shows that historically, Gary Livermore has bet up to 4 points on a given selection. But so far this season, it has almost exclusively been bets of either two points per bet or, occasionally, just 1 point per bet. Under normal circumstances, I may highlight the impact that this betting strategy has on the overall results but given that Jumpers only runs for half a year, it makes some sense to double up the stakes.
Finally, let’s talk strike rate. This is an area where Jumpers has really impressed me because honestly, it’s incredibly bloody consistent. The average strike rate comes in at 32.71% which is a respectable enough number. But what is really impressive about it to me is that it is genuinely reflective of the kinds of results that you can expect.
How Does Jumpers Work?
Gary Livermore talks a fair amount about his reputation in the betting community. He also talks about how his knowledge is constantly evolving and that he builds on this continuously “from “times served””. He also talks about how Premium Sports Tipsters were insistent that he prove himself, and that they agreed to do this over a full season. Note that this doesn’t actually tell us anything about what the selection process actually entails.
Outside of this, we are given a few other bits of insight. Firstly, we are told that the idea of focusing on National Hunt racing allows Gary Livermore to have “total focus”. There is a certain amount of sense to this, but again, there still isn’t any actual kind of explanation about how bets are identified for Jumpers.
About the closest that I think we get to any sort of explanation is where Gary Livermore says that he will “never bet for the sake of it if I see no value”. Now, the odds do imply that there is a strong value element here, but for me, that statement does somewhat back it up. Unfortunately, this still doesn’t give the insight that one would want. Which is a bit frustrating and disappointing as it effectively means coming into Jumpers blind.
Sure, there is an argument to be made that a season and a half of proofing is plenty enough to give you an idea of what you are getting yourself into. And I think that it definitely does count for something. It is great if you are looking to get an idea of the “ebb and flow” of the results. But for my money, it still doesn’t necessarily tell you a whole lot.
What is the Initial Investment?
If you want to sign up to Jumpers, there are a number of different options available, each of which comes with wildly varying costs and value for money. The cheapest option in terms of the initial outlay is a monthly subscription which is priced at £36.
There is slightly better value in signing up for a half season (3 months) at a cost of £77. This brings the monthly cost down to about £25.60. Of course, if you are going to sign up on a quarterly basis, you may as well sign up for Jumpers for the full Jumps season (6 months). This does involve the highest outlay with a cost of £89, but that is just £12 more than the quarterly price.
It is worth noting that Premium Sports Tipsters don’t really offer any sort of money back guarantee on their products and services. Of course, this includes Jumpers. This means that whilst you do get much better value signing up for those longer subscription lengths, it is quite the commitment.
What is the Rate of Return?
Where Jumpers is undoubtedly at its most appealing is backing selections to BOG. Doing so would have seen a considerable profit of 227.28 points since October last year (which doesn’t sound a lot, but you have to keep in mind you’re only betting for 6 months). The ROI is also impressive coming in at 29.67%. So far, so good.
To SP however, you are looking at a profit of just 67.47 points. That is a drastic drop and it perfectly highlights to me why it is so important that you are getting the best possible odds. Because the fact of the matter is that without that, this simply isn’t a worthwhile endeavour.
Conclusion for Jumpers
I want to start by talking about the negatives that surround Jumpers. Because, well, probably not surprisingly, there are a good few of them. The most apparent thing to me is the potential limitations to profit that exist here. I know that I’ve talked about it in terms of a points profit, but I don’t really think that paints a full picture.
To SP, Gary Livermore has had 4 losing months as opposed to the 2 to BOG. The ROI drops hugely to 8.81%. I mean… There’s still a profit, and it is a credit to Jumpers that this is the case… But it’s difficult to justify it in my opinion. Especially compared to some of the other services that are on the market. They might cost more, but you are definitely getting what you are paying for in my opinion.
All of this is very important to keep in mind because otherwise, I quite like the ideas that Jumpers is built on. I don’t hide the fact that I fully respect any tipster service where the focus is on producing consistent and long term profit. Guess what there is here? Is it enough? Well, that’s more of a personal preference thing in my eyes. I don’t think paying £89 for an average of about 113.5 points of profit is bad at all (even if that is using 2 point stakes). Some people might disagree though, and I can see why to a degree.
Outside of this, I fundamentally like the principles that Jumpers sets out. It’s just a shame that there isn’t really enough information to make a truly informed decision about whether or not what you are getting into here. I know, I know, the proofing… but I stand by the fact that this isn’t a replacement for knowledge and genuine understanding.
Now, keeping all of this in mind, I don’t really think that I would look to recommend Jumpers. Which might sound like a strange position to take given the fact that I’ve really sung the praises of it so far. But it all comes down to one thing. And that is a lack of consistency, which is a weird thing to say because in many respects, Gary Livermore is very consistent with his results.
The problem that I have with this is that in order to attain this consistency, there are just too many variables in place. I know full well that you should always be aiming to get the best possible value, but when the whole worth of a service hinges so desperately on it… Well, it seems like a bit of a problem longer term. Sure, every tipster service is at least somewhat conditional, but seeing it laid out so clearly just doesn’t really help paint Jumpers in the best light.
